eResources Search Examples - Searching Module

Owned by Jennifer Koerber (Unlicensed)
Last updated: Jun 27, 2019
5 min read

 

In this video, we’re going to review searches related to eResources in Alma. The eResources Overview module will go into more detail on eResources records and concepts – this introduction focuses on how to find basic information about eResources for all staff.

All Titles

As we’ve seen, any Titles search type will find bibliographic records that match the criteria. An All Titles search type will find all bib records for both physical and electronic formats, so it’s the broadest possible materials search type.

In the search results, you can look at the tabs in each row to determine if a bib is for a physical or electronic item, and use the facets on the left to limit your results.

So, if I wanted to limit to electronic books, I click on Book – Electronic and see one digitized book and three original eBooks. Again, for more information about these records, expand all to see the Interface, Collection, and Service types.

Electronic Titles vs. Collections vs. Portfolios

Next, let’s look at eResources specific search types.

An Electronic Title is the bibliographic-level information about an electronic resource; these records are maintained directly by Ex Libris and made available to all Alma institutions.

An Electronic Portfolio is the specific coverage, services, and link information relevant for an electronic title. Portfolios may be defined as standalone entities or as part of an electronic collection.

Electronic Collections organize electronic resources for delivery and publication by provider and service; those eResources can include electronic journals, databases, or e-books, among others.

Let’s see the differences in these three record types using Sei Shonagon’s The Pillow Book as an example.

Search by Electronic Title when you want to find an eResources bibliographic record. If I search by Creator for Shonagon, Sei, I get one bib record for the Pillow Book Penguin Classics edition. If I expand the additional information, I see that it’s available via ProQuest’s Literature Online Complete in full text. I can click on View to see the Portfolio record or click on Portfolio List to view all portfolios for that title.

Notice that I can also click on the Community tab to see other electronic versions of that title, whether Harvard owns them or not. This is the advantage of the Community Zone, which we learned about in the Community Zone video. The edition that Harvard owns has a blue house icon next to it.

Now, I can conduct an Electronic Portfolios search for Shonagon as Creator and get to that portfolio directly. I could click on Other Details and get to the license for that portfolio, if we wanted to.

Finally, I can use the Electronic Collections search type for the same search and see that the only collection holding her work is the LION Complete collection from ProQuest – if it was in more than one collection, they would all be listed here. Another use for a collection search is to get to a full list of portfolios available in that collection; click on Portfolio List to see all 15,660 of the items in this collection (if I wanted to). Again, Other Details will get us to the license information for this collection.

Next, let’s look at searches for Vendor and License records directly.

Vendor and License Records

To find eResources vendors you can:

  • From the Acquisitions menu, click on Vendors to see a list of all vendors for the library. From here, click on Vendor type and choose Access provider, Licensor, and SUSHI vendor (those providing SUSHI information about usage).
  • To see this same list, you can also use the persistent search bar and the Vendors search type. Leave the search term box blank and just click Search for all vendors. Again, use your vendor type to limit the list.
  • Or, you can use the search bar and the Vendor search type to search for a specific name, such as Springer.

License Records

You can also use the search bar to find individual eResource licenses, if needed. Choose Licenses as your search type and then use the licensor, license code, or license name to search for what you’re looking for. In this case, if we search on EBSCO as licensor, we see the seven different EBSCO licenses, then click on any of them to view it, the Summary and, more importantly, the license terms. If you see a text box like this, it may have an expandable bottom, so you can pull it open to see everything that’s in the box.

The Advanced search for licenses is really useful because it doesn’t just contain additional basic search criteria, it also lets you search for any individual type of license term. For some of them, it will give you drop-downs to help make searching faster. So, for Course Pack – Electronic, I can click and I will get Permitted, Prohibited, Silent, Uninterpreted, or Not Applicable, so I can choose quickly to find any license that matches that license term.

[Not spoken: The results list will give you the full name and codes of the license, the start and end dates, and other basic information, and you can click on the title of the license to see the complete record. This includes a summary of information, the full license terms, and a list of active and previous eResources that are under this license. If you click on Print license, you can send a printable copy of the license to yourself.]

Authority Records

Finally, another useful search for eResources materials are for Authority records.

Choose Authorities as your search type in the persistent search bar, choose the criteria you want to search on, and then type in your search term. Notice that Alma will retrieve any authority records related to that search term: in this case, all of the names, series, and subjects that mention Haruki Murakami.

There are two facets on the left, for Heading Usage and Vocabulary so you can limit your search.

If I click on the header for any result, I can view the MARC information for that authority record.

To find all of the bib records related to any particular authority record, I can click on Search bibliographic records matching this value over on the right, and that will launch a search in Alma as well.

I want to point out that if you see a See Also section in the result, all of these will also be links and if I click on it, it will run a search for that authority record.

More Information

Again, for much more information on eResources, please watch the eResources Overview module in this online course, or read through the documentation available on the Alma wiki or in the Ex Libris Knowledge Center.